Beginning to die

I am beginning to die.

It is conveyed to me

in the silence that weighs in behind the chirping the cooing and the murmurs.

It is written in the dust in the road to the river.

I walk to my death as I walk to the river.

And the river walks to her death.

I live now in my words, my thoughts, my fears.

She lives now in the trees, the babblers, the eddies and the sand.

But we are both walking to our deaths.

I sit on the banks and watch us die.

And it is a slow peaceful death.

It is death by waiting.

As the water runs,

I fade away.

No flesh.

No bones.

No ash.

Not even a shadow

Nor a memory

And then the river dies.

No ripples.

No sand.

No trees.

No birds.

Not sounds.

Not even the silence that weighs in.

It all ends.

And in that there is hope.

The hope that that which is there will not be there.

And therefore it is beautiful.

I am beginning to die.

And therefore I'm willing to live.